


The Stone Tree

by mstigergun



Series: Inglorious [12]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Emotional Constipation, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, The Storm Coast
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-14
Updated: 2015-09-14
Packaged: 2018-04-20 19:32:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4799615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mstigergun/pseuds/mstigergun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a cave on the Storm Coast that poses a problem -- and if the entire vile coast wasn't made wretched enough by the darkspawn and the demons and the bears, there's the <i>fretting</i> to consider, the bright thing that lives inside his chest and that he would happily see excised.</p>
<p>In short, Leonid offends some soldiers, fights some darkspawn, finds himself transfixed by Basten's new armour ("it's traditional," he insists but <i>surely</i> there is nothing <i>traditional</i> about being scantily clad and half-wrapped in ropes). He also feels a thing or two, though he would rather not.</p>
<p>Set directly after <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/4778234">"Full Draw."</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Stone Tree

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks always and forever to [enviouspride](http://enviouspride.tumblr.com) for helping me out and leaving the most glorious comments on my draft-in-progress and for answering my really obscure and sometimes odd questions. And for buying the Spoils of the Qunari DLC, which, like. [_Yes please_](http://enviouspride.tumblr.com/post/128473060096/best-5-ever-spent-possibly-mstigergun-leonid).

_The Stone Tree_

*

Codex Entry (retrieved on the Storm Coast)

 

> So Galen made his way through the wood until he saw the light of the quarter moon shining on the rock. Elise emerged from the pines, and they shared a quick embrace before making their way to the waiting ship.
> 
> \--From a local version of The Resourceful Lovers
> 
> It's said that lovers who kiss the stone tree will be blessed with a long and happy marriage. Those fond of the superstition tend to ignore renditions of the tale in which Galen and Elise drown at sea,
> 
> \--Sister Holda, from her unpublished work Folk Nonsense and Other Absurdities

*

He does exceedingly well, really, all things considered. The ball is a huge success: Leonid swans his way through the room, dances with a representative from nearly every noble family in attendance, and politely turns down _three_ propositions. Furthermore, the display the Inquisition soldiers put on the next day makes the comtesse turn so pale that Leonid is briefly concerned that she’ll die without passing on her impression of their military prowess.

As it so happens, she survives and so he counts the entire venture a victory. If he laters holes up in a brothel right next to the ocean, so close that he smells salt when he’s being fucked senseless by a Rivaini man wearing so much gold that he could buy all of Ostwick and still consider himself wealthy indeed – well. Lady Montilyet said nothing about what he was or was not permitted to do once the ball concluded, and so he decides that it’s entirely within his purview to reward himself for a job well done. Nary a poisoning to be had nor a blood mage in sight!

That the man later tries to _pay_ Leonid because he’s mistaken him for a whore matters little enough, Leonid thinks happily as they leave the city and head back toward Skyhold. Indeed, Leonid takes it as a rather significant compliment. To think he’s comparable to a professional! Perhaps he _ought_ to start charging.

That would have the effect of cutting down on the number of balls he was made to attend. And, as bonus, of horrifying his mother. _You told me I’d be destitute_ , he might write. _As it so happens, I can do quite well for myself if only I start asking for coin in exchange for that which I’ve offered freely before. Why, at this rate, I expect my income will surpass Viktor’s by the end of the year. The Maker blesses each of us with gifts, as so often you’ve said, and mine appear to include entrepreneurship and fucking. Remarkable!_

He even gets on with the soldiers, which isn’t terribly surprising considering that they have so much in common – namely, a love of drink and of running their mouths. It’s something that’s always drawn Leonid to soldiers.

Well, that and their tendency to be quite _well formed_. That the dozen soldiers accompanying Leonid are _less_ dashing than usual only upsets him briefly, because he’s clever enough to understand that fucking one of the Inquisitor’s soldiers while on the Inquisitior’s business is not, strictly speaking, the brightest of ideas. Were they back at Skyhold where his time is his own, the situation would be entirely different.

The trip back is simple enough, Leonid writing up his reports over significant amounts of ale every evening while the captain keeps her soldiers from getting _too_ rowdy. Pity, Leonid thinks one night as she hauls a young woman off the table, where she’s reenacting a military maneuver she’d read about in some obscure text with the surrounding chairs standing in for her enemies. It’s good to see the Herald’s people _relaxing_ – being slightly more human.

When there’s so much at stake, it would be a pity to forget about fun. It’s certainly what keeps Leonid’s feet planted firmly beneath him. If he allows his mind to turn in the direction of his friends, he feels himself grow unsteady, the trembling of his heart against his ribs –

So he doesn’t allow himself to think on any of them for too long a period of time. Instead, Leonid drinks and writes his reports and gambles with the soldiers and with strangers who materialize in the taverns and inns they stop at along the way back to Skyhold.

It’s not until they’re staying in a disgusting little inn in a village remarkable only for its quantity of mud and disappointing lack of charming and rugged shepherds or farmers’ sons that the Inquisition messenger finds them. She stumbles in on road-weary legs as Leonid’s chewing thoughtlessly on a pastry – or what passes for one – just before noon. “Thank the Creators,” she sighs, working her way over to the captain of their little retinue and thrusting a message at the woman’s chest. “New orders: you’re to stop at the Storm Coast and offer assistance.”

The food in Leonid’s mouth turns to ash. “The Storm Coast?” he asks, as Alize flicks the parchment open, bright eyes scanning the words.

The messenger nods, wiping rain from her tattooed brow. “We’ve run into some problems with the darkspawn. There’s a rift in this cave and – It’s complicated, but fair enough to say the darkspawn are more plentiful than we’d imagined. Just heard back from Skyhold about how to proceed. The Inquisitor won’t be able to come for ages, so I was to come and get you to offer aid.”

Leonid pushes himself up, shoving the rest of his breakfast away. “Let’s move then.”

Alize nods, at once the captain and not the woman who’d led her soldiers in an impressive rendition of that song Marybel had written about Sera only the previous evening. “If the Inquisitor thinks our hands will be useful, then we’ll be there.”

“We’ve only got our _ceremonial_ armour,” says Cayla, who’s still squinting at the gray light filtering in through the grimy windows, voice raspy from too much drink the night before. Around her, murmurs of assent.

“Ceremonial armour’s still armour, soldiers. And we’re the closest aid by several leagues. Would have been closer still if someone hadn’t _lingered_ in Amaranthine.” With a pointed look at Leonid as she swallows down the rest of her tea in one too-large gulp.

Leonid’s neck stiffens. “Yes, because I was the _only one_ –”

Alfric, who’s nursing a hangover after he got into an ill-advised drinking contest with Leonid the previous night, sighs loudly. “Course you weren’t, Trevelyan. You were just the _loudest_. Like _now_. Still, give us an hour and we’ll all be in better shape. If we’ve got to ride up the coast in full gear, we might as well finish our tea and –”

“I hardly think so,” says Leonid, tossing Alfric a dark look. “An hour could make every difference. l’ll settle up. Have yourselves ready by the time I’m done.”

Alize’s eyebrows shoot up, a skeptical crease on her forehead. Strictly speaking, she is the captain but –

Well. This company has been charged with accompanying _Leonid_ , which puts him firmly in charge, he supposes. If he has to use that power to rush them along, so be it. If the darkspawn on the coast pose enough of a problem, if there’s a _rift_ and _demons_ , then –

Leonid slips around the clusters of tables in the tavern, his stomach a tight coil of nausea. Basten is on the Storm Coast. Kata-Meraad was charged with being on the _frontlines_ when fighting the darkspawn because, of all of them, it’s only their leader, Kubrasan, who has any real experience battling the hordes. Most of the Inquisition soldiers are too young, or were too green during the Fifth Blight, to be of use.

Which means Basten will be –

Leonid shoves the thought away, instead focusing on what he can do: namely, finding the innkeeper and hauling the man out of the root cellar where he’s tallying the remaining winter stores. He throws more coin at the man than is strictly necessary – but good will, Leonid insists, is something entirely possible to buy with gold.

When he emerges out into the yard beyond, having packed his clothes and hauled on his travelling leathers, it’s to soldiers sluggishly readying their mounts, soft rain beading against the metal of their armour. Leonid scoffs, fetching his horse from the stable and getting her readied in the span it takes Alfric to pick out his horse’s hooves, for Wallas to attach his bedroll to the saddle, for Cayla to fuss with the clasps on her breastplate. Leonid secures his saddlebags, then swings up, his mare prancing beneath him – no doubt sensitive to the tension stiffening his fingers, making him thoughtless on the reins and tense on her back. He apologizes with a pat to her shoulder and waits.

The others climb on their horses, Alfric settling on his gelding with a loud, exaggerated sigh. Even the messenger, though her eyes are lined with bruise-dark shadows, swings onto her hart, who seems entirely unwinded; he would have expected her to rest for the day at the inn, but she doesn’t even hesitate. Clever, Leonid thinks, to send a Dalish messenger after them: anyone else might have stopped for a break, but the Dalish agents of the Inquisition are unquestioningly loyal to the Inquisitor.

It’s what they need when time is of the essence – people who will go until they break. Especially when so much is at risk.

Leonid kicks his horse off and they leap forward in a clatter of hoofbeats, a small fleet pounding toward the Storm Coast. The rain above continues to patter down, trickling down the back of Leonid’s neck and inching down his back. Soon enough, even his leathers succumb, and the fabric of his tunic becomes a second skin, one that scratches and chafes in the rain. They stop briefly in the later afternoon, drawing to the the side of the road to rest though Leonid’s on his feet the whole time, pacing back and forth.

Another few hours and they should arrive, he thinks. The messenger left last night, which means that there has been nearly an entire day for things to go to shit. To –

He stares out hard at the Waking Sea, the road they follow dipping out toward the coastline on occasion to more sensibly connect villages. Which makes the route all the less direct, and _direct_ is what they need when trying to make their way to where Kata-Meraad is encroached on all sides, by darkspawn and _demons_.

Where Basten –

Maker be damned, to be pinned when fighting darkspawn. Leonid’s gut twists in on itself, rotten. He finds the messenger, who’s chewing thoughtlessly on a hard heel of bread. “Has anyone been hurt?” he asks.

He should have asked earlier – but then he wasn’t sure if he wanted to know. There remains a part of him that believes if he doesn’t allow himself to entertain any dark possibilities, they won’t come to fruition. Though now, so close to the Storm Coast and yet so _agonizingly_ far, he sees that impulse for what it was: wishful, weak, something that might hurt him far more than it ever lets him stay steady on his feet.

Now, he needs to know. Feels it burning in his bones. He will hear what he’s walking into, whether it’s to a hungover and impoverished friend or a woman saying he’s dead – like an eclipse, an impossible darkness emerging from absolutely nowhere at all. He will know if he’s got a chance of seeing Basten again, or –

The elf’s forehead creases. “There weren’t any injuries when I left. But part of the mercenary company got separated from our soldiers, and we were holding off darkspawn from one direction while – It got complicated. Couldn’t be in that many places at once.”

Leonid nods, then paces again toward the precipice that looks out over the waters. The rain has let up, although everyone is still dripping wet. Though the salt air still dampens exposed skin. He reaches and shoves his hair off of his forehead.

If Basten –

“That’s enough time,” he says. “Let’s get moving.”

Alize nods, standing and wringing the last drops of water from her long braid. The other soldiers follow suit, one by one standing and stretching and grumbling. “Can’t believe we’re going this hard for _mercenaries_ ,” mutters Alfric, who’s turned green on the ride. Around him, a few jerky nods of agreement.

Leonid stiffens. “They’re still _ours_ ,” he snaps, fingers stiff as he tugs the stirrups down from where they’ve been tucked. “Which means we’ll ride hard.”

To the side, one of the younger soldiers – Wallas, barely old enough to grow a beard before he’d joined up, and who still looks shrunken inside of his armour – snickers. “Ride hard so _he_ can ride hard,” he hisses at Alfric.

“ _Wallas_ ,” Alize barks.

Around her, the soldiers fall silent, though Leonid can feel the weight of their pointed stares. Though his skin prickles with their attention. He knows who they think he is – some noble playing games while they do the hard work. They assume that just because he drinks and sleeps his way through Skyhold, that he doesn’t – That he isn’t capable of –

Enough. Leonid pivots on Wallas and Alfric, who he’d bought strings of drinks, who he’d taught new card games though he refused to take their money. His lips curl into a smile that is all poisoned sweetness. “Such _wit_ ,” Leonid drawls. “Did it take you the whole trip here to come up with that? Well _done_ , though at such an inopportune time. And how curious I imagine Cullen would be to hear that you thought it better to spend time talking about who I fuck than riding to the aid of our _allies_.”

Both men stiffen, their ceremonial armour glinting in the gray light. To their side, Cayla has stopped tugging knots from her horse’s mane and shoots him a stare like daggers.

Ah yes, the unquestioning loyalty among soldiers. If only they had an iota of the same devotion to the _other_ members of the Inquisition, to the mercenary company throwing themselves headlong into _danger_ for their sake, because they were too green to handle the same damned situation.

Fury lights up his blood and blots out the little tact that he’d scraped together for the ball. In its place, something vicious and familiar, a cruelty he’s been trained to. He turns his attentions to Cayla, preparing his words like a cluster of arrows – precise, and _barbed_.

“And what _would_ the Inquisitor think, I wonder,” he continues, meeting her hard stare, “should I mention that little _song_ you wrote about where your eyes fall when the Herald runs hither and yon throughout Skyhold.”

At once, she jerks back. “That was – It’s a _joke_ ,” she begins.

“Trevelyan,” starts Alize, voice tight.

“And our dear captain,” he adds, pivoting hard to stare at Alize, her mouth twisted in a thin, downward line, helm tucked under one arm. “Who let _three_ of her soldiers leave their post early so that they might _see the city_. Such nobility, to forsake one’s duty for the entertainment of simpletons who hail from vile little backwater villages more mud and shit than anything else. Tell me, do you think Commander Cullen would be impressed with your _leadership_? I doubt it, but we can certainly see.”

Around him, silence, except for the screaming of gulls and the echo of waves crashing against cliffs in the distance.

It’s Alfric who breaks the silence, green though he is. “So you pretend at friendship, just to turn back into the noble prick you are? Not worth the cloth used to dress you, you are; can’t fight, can’t offer anything except your name and your _body_ to anyone _stupid_ enough to stick it in –”

Alize catches Alfric by his upper arm and shoves him backwards. “Mind your tongue, man,” she snarls, eyes flashing for a moment to Leonid – whose skin has burned itself hot, who feels something sharp lancing him, his chest rising and falling hard – before focusing again on her soldier. “He’s _right_ : think what the Commander would say, to hear you were complaining instead of getting the _job_ done. And,” with another quick look over her shoulder, “we must remember that Lord Trevelyan has the Inquisitor’s ear. He’s a person of _significance_ , as Lady Montilyet was sure to remind us.”

“Which is why he got to drink champagne and dance while we stood in our bleeding armour for six hours.” Cayla mutters the words under her breath, turning her back on Leonid as she tugs at the buckles of her mount’s bridle.

It’s not _fair_. Leonid didn’t want this mission; he didn’t _request_ it, and he certainly didn’t tell Josephine to remind them that his name counts for so much more than their blades. That was never what he wanted; _isn’t_ what he wants. “I didn’t _ask_ –” Leonid starts.

Alize turns and shoots him a smile that is not kind in the slightest: one that’s perfunctory, polite, and cold as the highest peaks of the Frostbacks. “It hardly matters, my lord,” she says, tone clipped. “We all do what is demanded of us. We all serve the Inquisition in our own ways, regardless of the taste certain charges leave in our mouths. Now if you’re ready to leave, Lord Trevelyan, we will follow.”

_Lord Trevelyan_. The title echoes in his ears as he stands, tight-shouldered, by his horse. They haven’t referred to him by his title since – _ever_ , he thinks distantly. But if that’s what it requires to get these idiots back in line, Maker help him, he will do so. He hardly needs to court favour with this cluster of fools when far more pressing issues are at stake.

Leonid climbs onto his horse, and speeds her off at a run. Cullen’s soldiers _will_ keep up; it’s their job. And if he can spur them to greater haste, so be it. Else he’ll ride the length of the coast himself and do what he might to offer aid.

He’s gotten good at shooting things, despite what Alfric thinks. Leonid is worth more than his name; he _has_ to be, if he’s to come to the aid of his – companion. If he’s to make any difference at all. He has fought his whole life to be more than a Trevelyan. If he can’t manage that now, he might as well throw himself off these blighted cliffs. He won’t be dead weight, not when so very much is at stake.

They ride until the sun breaks free from its gauzy cloud cover and sinks toward the embrace of the dark waking sea. Light refracts across the oscillating waters, glittering with all the chill of diamond. Leonid’s legs ache from the long ride in the damp and cold, his back a line of tension, his nose and fingers and toes numb to the world, but still he rides. His horse, sure-footed and amicable, picks her way up and down tricky slopes once they veer off the main road and head toward the Storm Coast.

Only the Dalish messenger, Nehris, is able to keep up. The Inquisition soldiers fall behind until they’re nothing more than suggestions of shadow on the horizon behind them. Not that Leonid bothers looking often – he _will_ continue onward, soldiers be damned. They can call him _Lord Trevelyan_ all they like; he’ll outride them just the same.

Only Nehris remains at his side, able to keep up as he drives his mare toward the coast – as true as an arrow flying to a target. Her hart noses out in front of Leonid’s mare and carefully finds a path down gulleys, across streams, and past bristling thickets, all while the sky above deepens to twilight colours.

“You know them,” Nehris says, as she hops down to fight her way past some tricky deadwood. They’re close enough to the coast that he can again hear the echo of distant waves, though they still need to follow along paths he can’t see to find a route down to the beach where the Inquisition makes camp. “The Qunari mercenaries.”

“Yes,” Leonid says, throat dry.

“They’ve been a great asset to our cause. Three times I saw one of them take down darkspawn who would have had Inquisition blood.” She looks back at him, eyes catching the dying sunlight and reflecting like a cat’s – which might bewilder him more if he hadn’t spent so much time in taverns also frequented by Ostwick’s alienage elves.

“That’s because they _are_ Inquisition,” he says, tone flat. “Of course they’re an _asset_.”

Leonid understands that truth intimately: he saw how Kubrasan held Haven when others fled. He’s heard the other company members talking about the Inquisitor, about their cause, about stopping the end of the world. Hears it whenever they gather in the Herald’s Rest, which is nearly as often as Leonid frequents the place.

Most importantly, however, he knows Basten, and prattle on as Leonid might about the _dullness_ of virtue, Basten is – everything the Inquisition needs. And a great deal of fun, as a bonus, which is also what Leonid needs. Or wants. Or misses, or –

Something insipid. He swallows down the emotion, a dull ache that rests beneath his breastbone, and focuses instead on what he can do – namely, dismount from his mare and help Nehris try to move deadwood out of the way.

“You’ll hear no argument from me,” she says, grunting as they shove a log to the side of the narrow path that will lead them to camp. “Plenty would question my place in the Inquisition as well,” she adds, blinking through the dark with her impeccable vision and eventually lighting on the path. “Ah, here we are.” Nehris tugs at her hart’s reins, and the beast disappears into a path Leonid can barely make out in the dying light. Still, he trains his eyes on the messenger’s narrow back and leads his mare along after her, wary of the placement of his feet.

He’d rather not break his ankle again, especially when they’re so close to offering aid. Leonid would be an _asset_ rather than a burden.

In the distance, the waves roar more loudly, punctuating the eerie silence of the forest. As they duck past dark trees and thick undergrowth, the stars overhead gutting to life, he can also see a tiny flare of firelight on the horizon, like a candle in the dark.

They’ve made it, but Maker only knows what they’ll find.

He spares a moment’s thought for Alize and her soldiers, who try to ride through this woods at night – but then they’re professionals. Purportedly.

It’s as if Nehris can read his mind as Leonid edges down the rocky slope that leads to the beach where the fire burns. “We’ll send scouts back for your soldiers.”

Leonid huffs, breath misting the air. On the far horizon, the moon hovers just above the waters, a pale specter. “They’re hardly mine. You heard them.”

Nehris is quiet in the dusk, pausing only as Leonid traverses a tricky little switchback. Then, “It sounded to me like they _were_ yours. For a moment.”

They might have been – until they showed themselves to be unworthy. Until he –

He pushes the thought away. Other things demand his attention. As they move closer and closer, Nehris calling out to unseen scouts who then scatter up through the woods behind them to chase down the soldiers, Leonid’s heart beats more loudly against his eardrums, deafening him to the sound of the ocean. His blood pounds its way through his veins, an echo of what he felt at Haven.

Darkspawn hunt in these woods, and have trapped their people. Have trapped Basten, and –

He remembers so clearly when the Fifth Blight began, the year Yuliya left for her dedicated training with the Chantry. He recalls that loss – of his _best_ friend – feeling suddenly very small compared to the losses suffered by all of Ferelden. He used to sit in his window for hours and stare out over the white city, imagining it darkening as the Blight spread.

Leonid had thought, then, that he understood terror. But he hadn’t, not until Haven.

Loss, however, is something with which he’s intimately acquainted, and it’s something he is entirely unsure if he can weather again.

His throat is tight as they move down the beach, Leonid squinting hard at the fire. Above them, the last violet rays of light fade moment by moment, waves crashing to shore and dragging back on the pebbles that make the beach, the salt air licking at his skin.

A shadow materializes against the firelight. Broad shoulders that tower above the other bodies milling about. A familiar set of horns, even at this distance – ones he could pick out in a crowd of hundreds.

He lets go of a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding, and picks up his pace.

“Nehris!” cries a voice in the distance. “You got them?”

“I did – the soldiers are still on the road, but Lord Trevelyan’s come along.”

The set of horns swings, angling toward Leonid, and Leonid feels warmth flare immediately inside of his chest. He hands his horse off to one of the waiting soldiers, shooting the man a distant and polite smile, before slipping by him and toward Basten, who’s retreated to the edge of camp.

“Lord Trevelyan,” begins a man standing near the fire, who holds himself like someone in charge. Captain – _someone_ , who Leonid beat at dice once, he thinks. Hard to recall exactly; there was a great deal of drinking that evening, as usual.

“Don’t bother,” sighs Leonid. “I’ll be of no use to you. Just tell me what to shoot tomorrow, and I’ll do it. It’s Captain Gardin you’ll want. She should be along shortly.”

The man’s eyebrows shoot up, skeptical.

“Look,” Leonid says, pivoting to face the captain and tearing his attention away from Basten, who waits in the distance, painted by firelight and the soft silver moon overhead. “You could talk to me about military strategy all day and it would remain entirely beyond my grasp. There is a _reason_ the Inquisitor sent me to attend a ball rather than coordinating troop movements or scouting parties in some far and forsaken corner of Thedas. So, let me try this: is something horrible happening at this very moment that can be resolved by _shooting arrows at it_?”

“No,” says the captain, dry, though his expression suggests that, _yes there is and he’s talking to me right now_.

“ _Perfect_ ,” says Leonid. “Then I’ll retire for the night and you can speak with Alize.” And, like that, Leonid neatly shrugs off any duties the captain might have thrust upon him and wends his way through the camp toward things vastly more _engaging_.

Basten stands at the very edge of the wide ring of light cast by the fire, eyes gleaming in the flickering light. And he’s wearing –

Leonid almost trips over one of the soldiers sitting by the fire, who spits a curse at him and glares. But glare all he might, that doesn’t change the necessity of Leonid’s reaction.

Because Basten is wearing hardly _anything_. What’s passing for armour, if Leonid is generous, leaves his entire torso bare – which is carved out of light and shadow in the firelight, Leonid’s stare stuttering over the hard plane of his stomach, the rippling muscles of his abdomen. Just an inch lower, and Leonid would see the shadows that gather beneath his hipbones.

The fire heats Leonid’s skin, even at this distance, warmth crawling up the back of his neck. Intricate knotwork loops up and down Basten’s arms – like lines of ink, only capable of being used for much more fun.

Leonid works his way over, the skin of his cheeks hot. After a long, cold journey, being in a camp that’s almost dry and boasts a blazing fire has left him almost uncomfortably warm, skin ghosted by the heat rolling off the fire.

“You made it,” Basten says, leaning against a wizened tree, or what passes for one this far down the stony beach.

“I see your _armour_ didn’t,” Leonid replies, his voice a heated rasp to even his own ears.

Basten’s mouth curls into a broad smile. “It’s traditional,” he offers, still leaning against the tree, unconcerned. “And there’s a lot less to get soaked during the day and to dry out at night.”

A little laugh escapes Leonid’s mouth, but his mind is far too hazy to piece together a witty response. They’re too far apart, Leonid feels that immediately – a _need_ to run his hands along those clever knots, to see precisely how quickly his fingers might untangle the ones hovering between Basten’s hips.

Beneath that all, bright and immediate as it is, lies something else. Something lower, insistent, as unrelenting as the pounding of the waves in the distance, the sound of the stones being dragged out to sea.

Basten is _fine_. He’s safe, and Leonid can breathe.

“Your hair’s different,” Basten says, pushing himself off of the tree and reaching out. His broad fingers brush Leonid’s hair from his forehead, damp though it is, trace the shape of his skull along the line where his hair is cropped close to his skin.

“My original colour,” Leonid murmurs, leaning closer despite himself. “Apparently, it makes me look more _respectable_.”

“It makes you look younger. And I don’t know how respectable you _can_ look – the moment you open your mouth, the illusion shatters.”

“I’ll have you know I managed to sustain the illusion for the _entire_ duration of the ball. There was no debauchery to be had!”

Basten laughs, a warm sound. “Which I assume you made up for afterwards.”

“Naturally.” Leonid’s hand finds the warm curve of Basten’s arm, fingers brushing against his smooth skin, then rising to trace the elaborate network of ropes. “So,” he says. “ _You_ don’t have the Blight. Is everyone else alright?”

“They are,” Basten says, blinking down at Leonid. The firelight catches his eyes, and makes his stare as bright as the sun. “I’m afraid that Captain Nicols was a bit quick in sending for aid. His soldiers have been a nervous mess. You should hear what Kubrasan has to say – _the least they could do is act like professionals. It’s just some darkspawn, not the Sixth fucking Blight_.”

Leonid huffs out a laugh, because he can _hear_ her in the way Basten shapes his words. “Your people aren’t _pinned_ , then.”

“No,” says Basten with his usual easy smile, hand falling to Leonid’s shoulder, thumb a warm heat against Leonid’s throat. “We had to split our camp to try and tamp down some of the darkspawn making it out of this cave – we couldn’t close it at the same time as the others because there’s a rift inside that keeps spawning demons whenever we get too close. And there are _bears_ , because what would a trip to the coast be without _bears_. It’s a mess. But we’ve got their numbers down now; have _them_ pinned, really, so long as they don’t find any new routes to the surface. Tomorrow we’re off to just seal the whole thing, at least until the Inquisitor can come and close the rift. Let the darkspawn and demons fight among themselves.”

“You move tomorrow, then.” Still, Leonid’s fingers linger against the skin of his arm – which is warm enough to burn the cold from his bones.

A nod of his head. “We do.”

“In that case, I can stay long enough to join you. I’d much rather shoot some darkspawn than dance with another Ferelden lord bent on anchoring his line to the Inquisition through marriage. You should have _heard_ them, Basten: _still unattached, Lord Trevelyan? Such a pity! But one we may yet remedy_.”

His eyes flash, amused. “And yet you managed to avoid their snares.”

“That I did! I’ve been avoiding my mother’s for _years_. Fereldens are hardly trickier than she is.” Leonid studies Basten for a moment. “If your company is camped up river, why are you _here_?”

Basten shrugs his massive shoulders, smile growing crooked. “I heard someone was showing up with soldiers. Though I’d say hello.”

“Is _that_ what you thought,” Leonid murmurs.

Maker, it should bother him – that Basten broke camp to wait by the fire on Leonid’s arrival. If he hadn’t ridden so hard, he might not have arrived until the next morning, and yet here Basten stood. Steady as ever, wry smile in place.

It should _bother_ him, but instead it just leaves him feeling – warm.

Basten’s broad palm slips around to Leonid’s back, resting on the curve of his shoulder blade. Leonid thinks, for a moment, that this is the kind of night that calls for a kiss: the ocean, the crackling fire, the silver moon high above.

May the Void take him, who _has_ he become?

In the distance, the echo of hooves clatter up the beach as the soldiers arrive, finally breaking free of the grasping woods and making their way to camp. Leonid casts a look through the darkness and sees the glimmer of their ceremonial armour as it catches moonlight and the distant yellow fire.

He _should_ stay in the Inquisition camp, Leonid thinks, but he recollects precisely the cold stare Alize had fixed him with. The scowls from the other soldiers, dark and wounded. He’d thrown his weight around, and that wasn’t without cost – not that he _could_ have done anything else, not when so many dark potentials had hung in the air like smoke.

Potentials that had amounted to nothing. Instead, this.

Leonid clears his throat. “It would be a pity if you waited for so long to just say _hello_ , Basten,” he says mildly.

Basten says nothing, though his hand stays in place against Leonid’s skin. Leonid slides in a little more closely, so that their bodies are very nearly touching – here, on the edge of camp, where light meets shadow and he can imagine, for a moment, that they have some privacy.

“I will admit this much,” Leonid adds, quiet. “I may have done admirably at the ball, but I did _less_ admirably on the road here. I’m afraid that I may have stepped on a few toes once the messenger arrived.”

“ _You_ ,” says Basten, eyes flaring wider – a _ridiculous_ and _lovely_ blue even in the dark of the night. “Stepping on toes? And I’d heard you were an excellent dancer.”

“I _am._ It’s just that not everyone grasps my wit as readily as you do, Basten. Some people even get _offended.”_ A quiet sound slips from Leonid’s throat, one hand reaching to catch the knots of Basten’s belt, tugging hard so that his hips move a little closer. “So if you’ve room, perhaps, in your bed – I should feel more secure having you by my side than the soldiers who’d now be quite happy to see a knife buried in my back.”

“Sensible,” Basten says, nodding. Then, with a wicked little grin that makes something _flutter_ inside of Leonid’s chest, _“Efficient,_ even.”

Maker damn the man to the Void and back again, with his arms and his smiles and the familiar smell of his skin – like leather and smoke and something almost sweet beneath all of it.

Leonid scoffs, heat pooling beneath his cheeks. “Shut up,” with a shove against Basten’s shoulder. “I’ll get my things, then, and we’ll be off.”

He picks his way back over to the other side of camp, Basten trailing after him. Leonid plucks his saddlebags free, rifling through them for the things he has immediate need of, being sure to sling his bow and quiver across his shoulder as well. Overhead, the sky stretches black as ink, the moon hanging in the sky like a silver globe. It paints the rugged landscape in silvers and whites, carving out shapes and shadows that reveal the character of the coast.

Once he’s collected his things, shoving a pack at Basten, they work their way through camp again and toward the glittering line of water winding its way away from the ocean in the distance – the river on which Kata-Meraad is camped. The soldiers with whom Leonid had been travelling glance up from where they’re crouched around the fire, road-weary and hauling off their armour.

Leonid brushes past Alfric, ignoring the feel of the man’s eyes on him.

_“Told_ you he wanted to ride hard,” hisses Wallas as Leonid slips after Basten and into the dark of the night.

Another time, Leonid might argue – might bristle and spit curses that cut as deeply as daggers, or else turn his considerable charm on the soldier and leave him a jealous mess – but now he can’t be bothered. Because Wallas, simple as he may be, is right – at least in this,  at least this time.

They move from camp, the moonlight casting the world around them in silver. Leonid’s eyes pin themselves on the shape of Basten’s arms, the rippling muscles of his shoulders, the shadows gathering along his spine. In the pale light, the ropes are even darker, like tattoos embossed upon his skin. How Leonid would like to –

“Careful,” says Basten, with a wry look tossed over his shoulder. “You’ll walk right into that tree.”

Leonid jerks back. Indeed, hovering before him is a ghostly pale tree, its branches scratching the chilly sea air. One nearly brushes against his nose.

“You’re _awful,”_ says Leonid, but he ducks around the tree just the same and catches the warm curve of Basten’s bicep with his hand. With his other hand, he reaches and tangles his fingers through those ropes – thin, but _strong_ – and tugs Basten down to him.

Their lips meet in a dizzying crush – hot and slick and _just right_ , precisely what Leonid had missed in the weeks since they’d last had stolen moments together. In a heartbeat, Basten’s hands have found the plane of Leonid’s hips, the dip in his lower back, and he pulls him tight against his body. Leonid _hears_ the breathy moan loose itself from his lips before he feels it, too distracted by the possessive strength of Basten’s hands, his firm mouth, his heat and size and –

“If you don’t have a tent to yourself, Basten,” Leonid murmurs against Basten’s lips, one hand tracing every inch of exposed skin, tracing the feel of his ribs beneath his muscle, the hard shape of his abs, “I will have you right here. I’m not sharing tonight.”

“I have a tent,” says Basten, words hot against the length of Leonid’s neck. “But that doesn’t mean –”

Heat ghosts Leonid’s skin, warming each and every inch of him when previously he’d only been chill. Making desire burn bright within him – like all the fires in the world live beneath his skin. “Perfectly right,” he says, chased with a breathy laugh. “Who says it can’t be both?”

And, like that, he finds himself tugging at the intricate little knots of Basten’s belt – which prove themselves to be no serious challenge when Leonid is so very insistent – and sliding his hand below the edge of the fabric while Basten breathes, ragged and hot, against the curve of his neck. Around them, nothing but the sound of waves upon the shore and the silver moonlight, and the joyous hammering of Leonid’s heart against his ribs. The pull toward _this,_ like the turning of the tide.

*

Light illuminates the canvas of the tent around them, Leonid squinting furiously at the panels. He wiggles closer to the bare plane of Basten’s chest, resting his cheek against the curve of his shoulder. Basten’s arm tightens around Leonid, tugging him tight against Basten’s ribs as Leonid sucks in a long, deep breath. Inhales the smell of his skin, living there – the warmth of his arm across Leonid’s back, the feel of him against Leonid’s cheek.

Finally, he can breathe. His eyes flutter shut again, one hand skating across Basten’s chest and tucking itself against the other side of his rib cage. Basten is so perpetually _warm,_ Leonid thinks distantly, contentment buzzing beneath his skin.

Beyond the tent, he can hear the sounds of camp: clanging pots, crackling fire, morning-hoarse voices.

“Bastion, did you and your boy want tea?” A familiar voice hovering right outside the thin tent.

Basten’s eyes pop open. Always, he’s like that: asleep one moment, perfectly awake the next. “Yeah,” he sighs, long and loud, arching his back as he stretches, though his arm stays folded around Leonid. “You?” With a warm look, one _just_ for Leonid.

He pushes himself up, grabs one of the blankets from the bedroll and wraps it around his waist, making his way to the tent flap to peer out.

“Leonid,” Raset says, a broad smile curling her lips as she blinks down at him. The morning light gleams off the metal casings on her horns. “New hair – you look good. And thoroughly _fucked.”_

“That would be because I _have been_ thoroughly fucked,” he offers, squinting at the pale blue sky overhead. The air is chill, and snaps at his exposed skin – like teeth against soft skin. “And exceedingly handsome, so I look good all of the time with _every_ hair colour. I don’t suppose you have coffee.”

“Of course we do, spitfire. That what you want?”

“I’d hardly ask if it wasn’t,” says Leonid, a shiver crawling down his spine.

“Kubrasan wants to be up and moving before long, Bastion,” she adds, craning her neck so that she can look over Leonid’s shoulder. Her pale eyes flick back to Leonid, full of glittering delight. “You joining us?”

Leonid smirks. “I’m not one to miss a chance at _glory.”_

“Right. I’ll warn everyone to watch for stray arrows, then. Be back in a second with your coffee, spitfire.” With a crooked smile and a wink, she takes off, disappearing behind the cluster of tents that separate them from the cookfire.

A flush heats the back of his neck, despite the cold air that makes goosebumps prickle up and down his arms. Leonid shuts the flap again and slides back into bed with Basten, shuddering for a moment against his skin as he tries to warm up. Basten laughs, a low, contented sound, and wraps his broad arms around Leonid.

“See?” Leonid mutters, mouth pressing against Basten’s collarbone in a thoughtless kiss. _“Efficient._ If I weren’t in bed with you, I’d have to be _dressed_ and _huddling by the fire_ and _listening as everyone makes jokes about the time I shot you_.”

One of Basten’s broad hands finds the small of Leonid’s back, fingers splayed across the plane of his skin, blue eyes bright in the morning light. “They like you, you know,” Basten says, quiet.

“What, your company? Of course they do. I’m _charming_ and they’re not _idiots.”_ He says it like it doesn’t matter, but despite himself, heat flares to life underneath Leonid’s cheekbones. He would be lying if he said he didn’t like being _liked,_ if he wasn’t pleased that Kata-Meraad found him – whatever it is they find him. Amusing, clever, _endearing,_ perhaps. The warmth spreads from his face to the rest of his body. To be _liked._ Thought of fondly, even.

He wiggles his way closer in the narrow bedroll, reaching with one hand to grab the curve of Basten’s horn. “And _you’re_ not an idiot,” he adds, falling into the depths of those lovely blue eyes. “Although your propensity for _headbutting_ enemies does occasionally give cause for concern.”

Basten laughs then, and Leonid can do nothing to stop the wide smile that curves his lips or the ache inside his chest. It’s stupid and he’s a fool, but Leonid can’t _help_ himself. He dreamt this into reality, and he’ll be damned if he pretends otherwise. He tugs Basten’s head down, pressing their lips together.

Basten’s hand hovers, for a moment, above the curve of Leonid’s jaw before it settles there, warm thumb tracing the shape of his cheek. His lips part, and Leonid shifts the angle of his head, tongue flicking out and –

“Got your drinks,” Raset says, just outside the thin fabric.

Leonid jerks back, though Basten’s hand stays against his face. “Thanks,” Basten says.

A pause, then, her syllables bright with a smile Leonid can _hear_ rather than see, “Be quick about it. Kubrasan might think the sun shines out your ass, Basten, but if you keep her waiting because you’re too busy with _his_ –”

Leonid snorts, rolling out from underneath Basten’s arm and tucking a blanket around his hips as he moves to the tent flap. “Raset,” he says when he sticks his head out and grabs the two metal cups filled with dark, steaming liquid.

“Leonid.” She grins at him, teeth a bright flash against the dark of her skin.

“Fuck off,” he says pleasantly. “And thanks.”

She laughs, a loud and free sound, and then heads back across camp as Leonid ducks inside their tent again. Basten pushes himself up and Leonid folds himself next to Basten’s side, shoving the little tin cup with tea into his waiting hands. “We don’t have much time,” says Leonid, taking a scalding gulp of the deeply bitter coffee. “So drink _quickly._ We couldn’t disappoint _Kubrasan,_ now, could we?”

“Of course not,” says Basten, taking a sip of the tea and then setting it carefully in the corner of the tent. “In fact, I think I’d rather have cold tea than a disappointed Kubrasan.”

“Wise,” Leonid murmurs, following suit and setting his cup near Basten’s. As soon as it leaves his hand, Basten tugs him forward, pulling Leonid into his lap, hands firm and _deft_ beneath the blankets. In the span of a heartbeat, he has Leonid laughing, breathless and hoarse, against his mouth, Leonid’s fingers tracing the points of his ears, the shape of his neck, tangling themselves in his soft hair.

When they finally get to their drinks, dancing around each other as they haul on their clothes in the small tent, they’re cold as ice. And Leonid can’t bring himself to mind, tossing back the coffee in one long gulp. He presses another hard kiss to Basten’s lips, hand lingering, for a moment, against the warm skin of his neck, and then he slips outside and into the bustling camp beyond.

After all, they’ve a cave to seal and a mission to complete – and then it will be back to Skyhold and some semblance of stability. And with a trip so brimming with bright potential, Leonid can allow himself to believe, for a moment, that this is Andraste’s hand shielding them from harm. That everything else will work out as well. That all will be _well._

He thinks it and, when Basten’s hand brushes his shoulder as he, too, meets the company around the fire, a warm touch chased by a pleased smile mirrored on both of their faces, Leonid _feels_ it in his bones too. Believes it right down to his marrow.

*

It’s a plan simple enough, as far as things go – which suits Leonid just fine, as he was _not_ exaggerating when speaking with Captain Nicols and truly possesses none of the military acumen both his sisters inherited from their father. The cave in question is a hike up-river, where Kubrasan’s secondary camp lies in wait to ensure that more darkspawn don’t riddle the woods. Easy to pick off a few at a time, but the opening to the deeps could easily become more of a threat should other forces gather beneath the earth.

All they can really _do_ is seal the entire cave, historical significance be damned, until the Inquisitor manages to get to the Coast to close the rift. Which means that the Inquisition soldiers form a broad perimeter around the cave, while Kata-Meraad uses the materials hauled into place for the few mages to manipulate into a barrier strong enough to keep the darkspawn at bay. For now.

Of course the darkspawn will fight. With the cave sealed they’ll be forced to try and find another route to the surface, and already Kata-Meraad and the Inquisition soldiers have sealed all the other entrances riddling these woods. Which is why Kubrasan is pleased to have another archer to add to her numbers. “You’re a good shot, I hear,” she says, as the company breaks from the fire and gears up. She stands near his side, staring down at him as Basten disappears into the crowd of towering Qunari, laughing at something someone says in passing. “When you’re not shooting my people.”

“That _was_ Basten’s fault,” Leonid insists, shouldering his bow and staring after Basten’s retreating back. “I don’t know how much he’s told you, but –”

“He’s told me _enough.”_ Her hand falls on his shoulder, a firm grasp, one that stops him from moving. Leonid goes perfectly still, shooting an unsteady glance Kubrasan’s way.

Kubrasan’s eyes are dark as night, her strong features set with a calm ease Leonid immediately recognizes as something Basten’s inherited from her. “I’ve known him for a long time,” she says. “Fifteen and sent away – expected to _manage_ because he was too dangerous to be around his family. A load of horseshit, of course, but still it means much the same thing.”

Leonid feels something twisting in his gut under her hawk-eyed stare. The sun is white in the sky above them, and she casts a dark shadow across his face. “And what’s that?” he asks, wary.

“It means he’s like a child to me. All of them are, more or less, but he’s special. Joined up after he’d been left by nearly everyone he loved. I held his hand through his first kill, made sure he didn’t believe the shit his parents spewed. There’s nothing monstrous about him, only good. He’s invaluable – to Kata-Meraad and to me.” Still, she blinks down at him, as Leonid’s skin itches. “Do you understand?” The words are careful, deliberate. Weighted.

He does.

Leonid’s attention flicks to the distance, the loud group of Qunari mercenaries laughing as they pick up their weapons, as they sharpen blades or fill quivers with arrows. Basten half-turns his head and catches Leonid’s stare even at this distance. Smiles.

Leonid’s been stupid. He knows it with a sickening certainty, one that tightens his throat and makes it difficult, for a moment, to breathe. He has rules for a reason, and he’s broken each and every one for this man. It does neither of them any good, not when Leonid understands what will happen.

It hasn’t gotten this far in – a long time. He should be beyond this, having learned these lessons intimately in his younger years. But, Leonid supposes, when the world falls apart one does become vulnerable to certain things. There are gaps in his armour, and he’s left them open for far too long.

Kubrasan’s hand remains against his shoulder. She’ll wait him out, he realizes. The woman has all the patience in the world.

He shoots her a quick smile, tight. “I understand,” he says. “And I’ll handle it.”

For a moment, a frown creases her forehead. Then she nods, hand dropping away. “You ever fight darkspawn before?” she asks, as she starts walking after her troops.

Leonid keeps up, adjusting his pace to hers. “No. And, truth be told, I had hoped to go the span of my life without doing so – but the Inquisition opens _so many doors_ we’d thought were closed before. A vanguard of _potential_.”

A huffed laugh, but it’s perfunctory. “Nothing quite so satisfying as killing something that could fuck you up like that. You’re in for a treat.” She shoots him another one of her knowing smiles. If it seems a little colder, a little more distant, well – Leonid thinks he must be imagining that. An echo to the chill wrapping itself around his heart, the shard of ice that rests jagged in his throat.

The company meets up with the Inquisition soldiers at some historically significant stone that for some unfathomable reason is called a _tree._ Leonid pointedly ignores the looks from the retinue of soldiers who’ve been his companions these past few weeks. He does notice, out of the side of his eye, that they all look weary and damp and _very cross_ , but he can hardly be blamed for the whole of that.

The Storm Coast, in its omnipresent gloom and miserable weather, has a way of wearing down even the most amiable and generous of attitudes. Leonid feels it, gnawing away at his bones, leaving him chilled in the depths of his chest, and he’s only been in the damned place for a day.

Basten, on the other hand, seems immune, because of _course_ he would be. He works his way over while Kubrasan and Captain Nicols confirm strategy, and comes to stand at Leonid’s side. “So,” he says. “Darkspawn.”

“I’m _ecstatic,”_ Leonid intones, edge of his mouth quirking despite himself. He shifts his weight, watching as Kubrasan cranes her neck to stare down at Nicols, as Alize stands, stiff, by the captain’s side and nods solemnly.

“Stay at a distance and you’ll be fine,” Basten says, as though Leonid doesn’t know. “If you get pinned –”

_“Yes,_ yes, run away,” Leonid finishes, with a sharp little glare. “I am but an archer. I know my place – far away and out of trouble. Why do you think I took up the bow? I’m too beautiful to be maimed, and haven’t even a fraction of the _gravitas_ required to be a Warden.”

“The armour would suit you,” offers Basten.

_“Everything_ suits me.”

Kubrasan turns back to her company and reiterates the instructions, though they’re the same as the ones gives around the morning’s campfire: archers on the ridge, mages near the cave, warriors and dagger-wielders fending off any attacks that make it past the arrows while the Inquisition soldiers guard their flanks from any unpleasant surprises, ursine or darkspawn. And, like that, they head toward the cave in question.

Nicols doesn’t even bother telling Leonid where _he_ ought to be. It is abundantly clear, Leonid thinks as Kata-Meraad heads off through the woods toward their forward camp, where he fits – and it isn’t with Nicols or his soldiers.

Leonid waits until the bulk of them have passed and then turns to follow, but Basten’s hand catches him. “Hang on a minute,” he says, hand still in place around Leonid’s bicep – a heat he can feel even through his clothes. One that sinks into his skin, a comfort.

After the remaining soldiers have passed them, Alfric pausing to shoot Leonid a dirty look that Leonid greets with a sickly sweet smile and tiny wave, Basten tugs him over to the tall stone towering above the trees on the plateau.

_“What,”_ Leonid asks, tone flat.

“It’s good luck to kiss under the Stone Tree,” he offers with a crooked grin. “I wouldn’t say no to some good luck.”

Leonid’s skin flushes warm as he looks up at Basten, suddenly unaware of the cold air, the omnipresent damp despite the spartan sunlight filtering through the prickly trees. “I don’t believe in good luck,” he murmurs, though he doesn’t move away. Doesn’t shift out from under the feel of Basten’s hand on his shoulder, his thumb brushing the shape of Leonid’s collarbone through his tunic.

“I’m sure that’s what you tell yourself when you lose at Wicked Grace,” Basten says, smile still crooked.

“Don’t be a fool,” huffs Leonid. “I never lose.”

It’s a lie.

“Besides,” he adds, trying to sound annoyed when he feels nothing of the sort, “this whole thing sounds suspiciously like something you’ve made up on the spot so that you can _kiss_ me.”

“Why would I make something up to do that?” asks Basten, perfectly innocent.

Leonid huffs out a sigh, short. He told Kubrasan he’d take care of it. Indeed, he recognizes that it – this _thing,_ whatever it is – does need _taking care of_ , though he’d never meant for it to grow into something that required handling. To grow into anything, really.

Still, he thinks distantly, one kiss can’t hurt. Leonid pushes himself to his toes and catches one of Basten’s horns in his palm, tugging down Basten’s mouth to meet his own. Immediately, Basten’s hands are on him, fingers sliding along the edges of his leathers, skillfully finding the seams where he can slip his fingers against the thin tunic and Leonid’s hot skin beyond and –

Leonid breaks free, a breathy and indecent sound lodged in his throat. “Now, now,” he murmurs. “We’re on the Inquisitor’s time. And, even more frighteningly, _Kubrasan’s.”_

Basten’s lips brush Leonid’s temple, hot. “Of course,” he says. “Later then. When we have our own time.”

Leonid doesn’t bother correcting him, holding on for another moment. Allowing himself _this_ before he’s forced to turn away. Finally, though, he turns and heads out after Kata-Meraad and the soldiers winding their way down steep slopes, Basten so near his side that Leonid can feel the warmth of his presence.

He’d rather he couldn’t. Would rather just _move beyond_ all of this now.

Leonid picks his way around rocks, more nimble than Basten by virtue of his sheer _desperation_ to get away. He’s able to break away and thread his way through the middle of the company. Catching a few cracked jokes about his shooting and responding with appropriate eye-rolling.

The river that runs from the cave in question and down the gulley is clear and _frigid,_ Leonid discovers when he forges it alongside Kubrasan’s archers, not stopping to look back at Basten or insist he be _careful,_ because that’s what Kubrasan is for. They scramble up a steep embankment, Leonid’s boots slipping out from under him several times as he climbs over loose stones and slick moss. Salat, another archer, catches his arm and hauls him back to his feet as if Leonid weighs nothing at all.

“Careful,” says the man. “Couldn’t have you getting hurt now.”

Leonid scoffs, brushing dust from the knees of his trousers. He pushes past his fellow archers, who tidily unshoulder their bows and nock arrows as Kubrasan’s ground forces move up the gulley, and finds his way to a stony promontory that affords him an excellent view of the scene below. The spindly trees that find purchase on the slope aren’t tall enough to cause him any difficulty, especially as he inches even closer to the edge.

“Watch it,” says one of the mercenaries, whose name he doesn’t know. “It’s a long way down.”

Irritation prickles beneath his skin. He throws her a sharp look. _“Really,”_ he says. “I _hadn’t noticed_.” He stays firmly in place, readying his bow in his hands.

The cave is a dark mark against the tall cliff face from which the glittering water spills, catching the white light that manages to fight its way past the clouds that have rolled in from across the sea. Below, Kubrasan’s mercenaries pick their way up the gulley, reaching what must be designated positions as they fall into stillness, one-by-one.

Basten stands near the front, his shoulders a relaxed line. Kubrasan waits at his side, hand resting lazily on the pommel of her sword. Her head tips toward his, and she must say something, because he laughs a moment later – a sound Leonid can hear even on this ridge, familiar and warm despite the chill of the day.

He looks back toward the sea, gaze skittering over the Inquisition soldiers dotting the woods, their armour glinting from even the deep shadows beneath the trees. He can even spot a few familiar faces, those wearing ceremonial armour despite the preeminently _practical_ nature of what they’re doing: Alfric stands downriver chatting with Cayla, though they’re meant to be watching the woods.

Leonid snorts, and fixes his attention again on the gulley.

Inside of the cave, something stirs against the darkness.

Kubrasan raises a hand and gestures toward the ridge where Leonid stands with the archers. To his side, the mercenaries loose a volley of arrows.

He can hear the sound that breaks from the cave even at this distance – shrill and furious – and in the span of a heartbeat, disfigured shapes begin to clamour forth from the thick darkness.

Leonid’s heart flutters against his ribs as he trains an arrow on a darkspawn, its uneven features, its white-limbed movement. His eyes narrow, hands steadying as the muscles of his shoulder bunch. When he lets the arrow loose, it splits the air – true to target – and buries itself in the darkspawn’s throat. Black blood froths out of the creature’s mouth as it collapses on lifeless legs.

It’s an excellent shot, Leonid thinks distantly, allowing himself a spare moment of self-congratulation as the archers beside him fill the air with pale arrows. He pulls another arrow from his quiver and repeats the process, smothering the latent anxiety from his mind and trying to return to the chill efficiency he’s honed in the practice yard. _They’re targets_ , he thinks – and it’s easier to believe here with the easy efficiency of Kata-Meraad around him, when he’s killing darkspawn and not Templars who could, any of them, have his sister’s face.

Salat grunts next to him as one of Leonid’s arrows finds a distant eye socket. “Nice shot.”

Leonid flashes him a quick smile. “I should say.”

Still, the mouth of the cave teems with darkspawn, trickling forward and scrambling up the parts of the barrier already pushed into place. Leonid’s attention flickers to Basten, who stands alongside the other mages from the company, and does – _something_ with his arms, a wide, graceful movement. The debris that’s been gathered around the mouth of the cave shifts, rearranging itself into something resembling a _wall_ rather than a _heap._

Leonid trains an arrow on another shape within the cave, this one with bolts of its own, and shoots the beast through the heart before it can aim its bow at Basten. Say what he might about being a perennial target for archers, Leonid would rather if Basten _didn’t_ take an arrow to the shoulder. Another one, at any rate.

As little clusters of darkspawn spill from the cavern, Kata-Meraad moves forward to meet them, casual and cracking jokes lost in the wind that bends the trees around him. He sees Resat slice one darkspawn from navel to throat, while the warrior at her side bashes the skull of another to a pulp, both of them looking no more concerned than if they were killing _nugs._

Leonid wishes he felt even a fraction of that same confidence, instead of the keen concern that hums beneath his sternum. He doesn’t dwell on it, however, too occupied with the darkspawn hobbling out from the cave.

One of the mages to the side shifts, arms hard shapes in front of her. Kubrasan steps forward as several darkspawn make it past the barrier, which is cobbled together from rubble and stone and now nearly halfway up the mouth of the cave. Leonid shoots at several of them, but his arrows fly wide, as do those shot from the archers to his side.

A lance of panic cuts through his heart as the darkspawn clamber toward Basten, who is lost entirely in the task at hand. Leonid leans forward – Maker _help_ him, he will skid his way down this hill, rocks and all, should he need to – but already Kubrasan has unsheathed her sword. She strides forward on steady legs and, with an easy twist of her torso, severs the darkspawn’s head from its pale shoulders. She even looks bored as she does it.

It’s over nearly as quickly as it began, the rest of the rubble cramming itself into place in the mouth of the cave. One of the mages flicks her hands and the entire surface glows a violent purple for a moment. At the very bottom of the pile, a trickle of water glints.

Leonid stands there, shoulders still stiff. Better yet to have blocked off the water entirely and let the whole blighted cave _drown_ – literally Blighted, in this case.

“Well,” he says, flashing a quick grin at his fellow archers as he shoulders his bow, “that wasn’t _so_ bad, was it?”

In place of easy smiles, however, he’s met with a line of wary frowns. “Too easy,” Salat mutters. None of the others have put their bows away, stares flicking over the landscape that surrounds them – suspicious.

“Maybe you’re just _that good_ ,” Leonid suggests, edging his way from the promontory on which he’s been standing, forearms aching from the endless stream of arrows he’d fired down into the gulley. “Or maybe the Maker’s actually taking an _interest_ for once.”

Still, their unsettled concern, their dark flashing eyes, makes something prickle beneath his skin as well. It _was_ easy, considering the fight Kubrasan had been expecting – the careful positioning of troops, the insistence that the perimeter be secured.

It’s that thought that pulls his attention. Leonid pivots his head to stare at Alfric and Cayla, who are laughing, now, downstream – the threat eliminated, Alfric’s even removed his helmet, gesturing wildly with his free arm while he launches into some tale. A tale that looks, from his jerky movements, to be about _puppets_ – but, then, he is Ferelden and that’s apparently something his people _like._

Leonid’s gaze slides past the two of them in their polished ceremonial armour and to the shadowed woods beyond.

Where something moves.

Immediately, his bow is in his hands again and he threads past the other archers, squinting hard at the darkness beyond Alfric and Cayla. A flash of white, a bare gleam of light off of black, polished armour.

Leonid’s pulse roars to life in his ears. “Alfric,” he shouts, hauling an arrow from his quiver and aiming it at the darkspawn emerging from the clotted darkness of the woods.

The man spins, and Leonid looses an arrow – it soars past Alfric’s shoulder, and thuds home in the darkspawn’s chest.

“For _fuck’s sake_ ,” hisses Salat, shooting a spray of arrows across the gulley, where a skittering crowd of darkspawn emerge from between the trees. “Soldiers are so fucking green they can’t even do their _one damned job_.”

Leonid pivots and stares wildly at the ridge across the way, the _flank_ meant to be guarded by Inquisition soldiers. Through the dark trees and over the jutting rocks, a horde emerges – the forest to the north is _riddled_ , like worms wriggling free from rotten wood. They spill from the woods downriver as well, rushing up through the cold water. The darkspawn flood the gulley from two sides, brandishing glinting, black swords and filling the air with dark-fletched arrows. All around them, a wild, delighted shrieking.

In the distance, Kubrasan roars something at her people. The archers have already repositioned themselves, lining the top of the bank and picking off darkspawn after darkspawn but –

The gulley is choked with them, the yelping horde surrounding Kata-Meraad. Which means – he looks upriver, where he can see Basten in the distance and the other mages, staves in hand. Already, darkspawn work their way down the slope, so many that _surely_ some will get past the warriors.

They’re all professionals, true, but this – this is precisely what Leonid feared.

He takes off down the hill, bow in hand, yanking arrow after arrow from his quiver as he jumps over jutting rocks and lands on loose stones that slide beneath his heel. Arrows soar over his head, shooting into the glut of darkspawn bodies roaring up the river and down the distant bank. Kata-Meraad has already moved to face the attack, warriors shifting to form a bulwark against the tide.

Leonid rushes to the river bed, heart hammering against his ribs, breath hard in his throat. He loses sight of Basten here on the floor of the gulley, but can make out the flash of magic in the distance – the twisting, sharp movement of Basten’s staff on the other side of a crowd of Qunari mercenaries locked in battle with the yowling darkspawn horde.

He hauls back hard on his bowstring, shoulder tight, and shoots a bolt through the heart of a darkspawn clamouring toward the side of one of the warriors, who twists in the opposite direction to smash in a skull with her maul.

“Fucking _Inquisition soldiers_ ,” barks Resat as she bashes a hurlock in the head with her shield.

“Inquisitor had better start paying us more,” her companion replies with a loud laugh, pivoting to plant a hard kick against the chest of an enemy, before stabbing it hard in the gut.

As if it’s perfectly normal to discuss _salary_ in the middle of a battle. As if –

Leonid trains his attention on the distant flash of bright magic, the air around him thick with shouts and darkspawn shrieking and the booming echo of Kubrasan’s voice, and he takes off up the river. Cold water splashing his legs, Leonid shoots again and again into the crowd of darkspawn surging down the opposite bank. On the ridge, he can see Inquisition soldiers, panicked, swords flashing as they scramble away.

He doesn’t have time to be furious at them for failing in their duties, or to be concerned for the fates of the soldiers he knows.

He only has time for this: to find his way to Basten’s side and make sure the stupid man doesn’t throw himself headlong into danger – _literally._

Behind him, a shriek – one that makes a fear as cold as ice prickle up his spine. Leonid twists, staring wide-eyed at the uneven gait of the darkspawn coming at him. Too close for an arrow, coming at him too quickly –

His bow drops from his hands, and Leonid hauls out the short knife he keeps in his boot. As the darkspawn rushes him, armour blacker than the Void and eyes a liquid darkness, he surges forward – meets it, blade slicing hard at the soggy cartilage of the creature’s throat. Hot blood, black and dangerous, spatters his knuckles, and Leonid immediately jerks back – away from the beast.

Panic lights him up, a fire in his very core. Leonid shoves the knife back in his boot, scrubbing his hands hard against his arms before he picks up his bow, thoughtless.

He’s _sure_ he doesn’t have any cuts, but the danger still sings in his mind, white as the furious sun overhead. His throat is dry, the din of the battle a distant echo in his ears. Leonid stares at the blood, dark against his knuckles. If he’s wrong, if he thoughtlessly nicked himself during the battle, Maker forbid –  

Next to him, the thundering of footsteps, fast and hard. Leonid twists, a jerky movement, arrow already taut against the bowstring.

“Should have stayed where I had you,” barks Kubrasan, reaching out and grabbing Leonid’s shoulder, shoving him out of the way as she swings her blade past him and at another knot of darkspawn running at them from downriver. Thick gouts of blood spill out into the clear water. “But,” she adds, shooting him a smile bright and dangerous as her ichor-spattered blade, “I told you it was _fun._ Now _go_ – Bastion will take care of you.”

“I don’t –” starts Leonid.

But Kubrasan’s already disappeared into the crowd of mercenaries and darkspawn, sword swinging, voice booming with firm commands and the echo of laughter, a joy Leonid can’t understand.

Behind him, he can hear the crackle of electricity, the air split with the sharp tang of lightning.

Leonid turns and heads up-river again, dodging the darkspawn who manage to slip past the line Kata-Meraad has formed, burying bolt after bolt in their bodies. If his hands shake while he hauls arrows from his quiver, so be it. He fights his way past the towering Qunari mercs, slipping past the lines of encroaching darkspawn, desperate to catch a glimpse of Basten.

Leaping from the water and on to the bank, he scrambles up onto a rock that affords him a look and –

Basten stands near the rock face that had once been a cave, throwing spells at the horde of darkspawn as it moves too near to the line of warriors, attention trained entirely on guarding their flank – which is what the Inquisition soldiers _should_ have been doing.

But it means he’s left his own open. Though the cliff is there, four darkspawn have found their way around the other side, down the slope that lies to the back of the troops.

Leonid’s heart stills in his chest, falls to perfect and utter silence. He would cry out, but the noise of the battle that surrounds them is a brutal cacophony. His breath catches in his throat like the edge of a blade, mouth thick with the taste of blood.

He can’t have this happen again.

His hand flies to his quiver and he losses a spray of arrows at the darkspawn. For each shot he misses, hands shaking, pulse stuttering, another finds purchase – though none enough to kill. One arrow buries itself in a thigh, another a shoulder.

It’s not enough. He nearly falls from the rock, hurtling himself through the space between he and Basten, ferociously elbowing his way past several warriors, who are counting off their kills in tones entirely to jovial for the incipient danger of the battle.

Leonid pushes his way through to a break in the crowd, arrow already notched in his bow, and he lets it fly as soon as there’s empty space between him and the target.

This one finds home, and one of the darkspawn collapses. The others push on.

_“Basten,”_ Leonid cries, voice hoarse, ragged. Fear makes his blood cold, like his heart is lined with ice that chills him with each frantic heartbeat.

Another arrow, then another. One more darkspawn falls, but two still continue toward Basten’s broad back.

Leonid bolts across the space between them, feet slipping on the wet stones, stumbling but –

Basten’s head swings at the flash of movement, and his stare falls on Leonid. Drops to the bow in Leonid’s hands, what _must_ be the panic written across his face – must be because it’s burned bright in every nerve in Leonid’s body and –

Basten twists, and sees the darkspawn rushing at his back. His hands flash out, the blade at the bottom of his stave connecting finding soft flesh beneath the breastpiece of one attacker’s armour.

Leonid’s next arrow slices through the throat of the other.

He gasps out a breath, relieved. Finds himself at Basten’s side, his hand reaching to catch Basten’s elbow, the whole world narrowing to the two of them – the battle sounds as muffled as if heard through water. “There,” he says around the tightness in his throat, fingers divoting the flesh of Basten’s arm. “The Wardens would never find armour to fit you anyway.”

Basten spares him a small smile, before turning again to the clashing of darkspawn against his company’s shields. At the forefront, Kubrasan stands, swinging her blade and catching limb after limb after limb. Basten twirls his staff, and a barrier flickers to life around her. A moment later, errant darkspawn sliding down the bank toward Resat, who’s standing on her own, are lit up by a flash of lightning and fall, stunned, to the ground.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Basten says, breaking his focus for one moment to shoot a quick look at Leonid. “You said you’d _run away_. This isn’t away; this is actually the opposite of _away.”_

“We work well together,” says Leonid, as he shoots a shrieking darkspawn through the throat before it can make it across the river. “And as it would seem that you can’t watch your _own_ back –”

Basten’s head turns, a quick gesture, and then Leonid can feel the humming of a barrier thrown around him, vision oscillating with the bright burst of colour as it’s cast. A half-breath later, and arrows flash against the barrier, falling uselessly to the ground.

So much for watching Leonid following his own damned advice and watching _his_ back. Leonid pivots and looses a cluster of arrows at the darkspawn archers who would have seen him dead, if not for Basten.

He hasn’t room for gratitude, however. Hasn’t room for anything beyond the endless stream of darkspawn, the shaking of his hands, the desperate panic whenever the enemy draws nearer. If anything were to happen – If they get close enough to Basten –

He won’t let it happen. Leonid pulls arrow after arrow from his quiver, hands never idle as he shoots as quickly as he can at the pale bodies teeming in the gulley. In the distance, Kubrasan has started laughing, neatly slicing through any knots of darkspawn still fighting toward her mercs.

“What’s your count, Bastion?” shouts one of the warriors, who’s leapt to a rock to get a better view of the battle.

“I’m at seventeen,” Basten booms next to Leonid. “But that’s because someone keeps _stealing_ my kills.”

Leonid says nothing, though he can _feel_ the grin Basten turns on him. Instead, he pulls back hard on his bowstring, and catches a distant hurlock through a gap in its armour by its shoulder. A moment later, one of Kata-Meraad’s two-handed warriors slices it right down the middle, and it slides into two wet pieces.

He runs out of arrows before they run out of enemies, hauling out the knife from his boot that’s still tacky with darkspawn blood and holding it, ready, in his hand. Basten, however, manages to keep the tide of darkspawn at a distance, and Leonid’s never forced to use it again. Which is just as well – his knuckles are white because of how hard he grips the hilt, his heartbeat an endless roaring against his eardrums, skin buzzing with a panic he can’t quite name, one that is larger than the sheer terror of fighting these creatures from nightmare. One as large as the Void.

Leonid isn’t sure he’d be able to string together enough strength to bury the knife home. His muscles quiver, echoes of the terror that saw him fly from the ridge and into the thick of a battle he barely knew how to fight. That saw him _here._

Around them, the battle clarifies: Qunari mercs start pressing forward against the tide of darkspawn still trickling down the hill. They edge their way up, laughing and swinging weapons, as darkspawn bodies fall beneath them.

Basten moves to follow, and Leonid catches his arm. “Don’t,” Leonid says, tone tight. He can feel the tension in his own fingers, how unsteady that grip is.

Basten blinks at him. “We’re nearly there. It’s _fine.”_ Said easily, as if this has been the most simple thing in the world.

But it hasn’t been, and what it _means_ – how _close_ Basten could have come –

What would Leonid have _done_ if those darkspawn had caught Basten unaware? How could he have – And now Basten’s ready to press onwards, to throw himself –

Leonid feels the tightness in his jaw, the ache inside his chest. “No.”

A crease forms between Basten’s eyebrows, but he shrugs and, a moment later, blasts a cluster of darkspawn archers on the ridge to pieces with white flashes of lightning. Done, however, at a _safe distance_.

Like that, it’s over, the last darkspawn bodies collapsing on the slope of the hill beneath the professional onslaught of a mercenary company prepared to deal with nearly anything. Kata-Meraad laughs, cursing the Inquisition soldiers who failed at their duties in the same breath, noisy and delighted and furious all at once. Captain Nicols and Alize emerge from the dark woods to meet with Kubrasan, each of them looking weary and pale and spattered in ichor. Faces etched with a grim acceptance that this was more than their people could handle. That without Kata-Meraad, all might have been lost.

Even with them, it would have been as easy as a stray arrow for all to have been lost. Like that, Leonid could have been back on the harbour, reduced to the numb echo of himself. A ruined specter.

It could have been as easy as a darkspawn arrow finding home, or Leonid’s bolts flying wide. The realization roars to life, fighting its way to the forefront of his mind. In it, he is reduced to nothing.

Almost that simple.

He never wanted to feel this way again. Has tried to –

Leonid swallows, throat dry. Legs numb beneath him.

He doesn’t remember that he’s half-covered in drying darkspawn blood until Basten reaches and pries the knife from his hands. “Let’s get you cleaned up,” he says, voice quiet, but firm enough for Leonid to hear over the distant echo of his heartbeat. Basten steers him to a rock and sits him down, crouching to cup clear water – still clear, this far upriver, unlike the burbling blackened waters that grow clotted with blood downstream – in his generous palms. He lets it trickle down over Leonid’s hands, rubbing his palms along Leonid’s knuckles, until all the blackness is washed away.

“You’re being quiet,” Basten says eventually, crouched next to Leonid as, all around him, his company and weary Inquisition soldiers begin to sort through the mess, through the broken limbs and black blood.

Leonid’s stare flicks up. “I _can_ be,” he says, a reflexive statement almost breathless with the echo of panic that still burns in his veins.

Basten tries for a smile. “I know that. Have even seen it once or twice.”

It’s meant to diffuse the frantic energy simmering beneath Leonid’s sternum, but it fails utterly. Instead, a broken sound escapes his lips – something between a laugh and a pained exclamation, like _this_ has left him with a cracked rib. As if somehow _this_ has brought him close to breaking, though everything turned out _fine,_ though Basten is here and he’s _alright._

Kubrasan was entirely right, of course: this has been _enough._ This – Leonid _knows_ it’s enough; _more_ than enough. Basten has seen too much, and Leonid walks too near the precipice to continue.

He pushes himself up, shouldering his bow and wiping his hands dry on his trousers, though even those are damp with the omnipresent mist that diffuses some of the stark sunlight. Makes it softer, though it pricks at the back of Leonid’s eyes all the same. “Alright,” he says, voice distant to even his ears. “I’m back to Skyhold, then.”

And, like that, he heads off, back toward the primary Inquisition camp, where he’ll pick up his horse and ride back to the Frostbacks. Though it might take some wrangling, he’ll get his retinue of soldiers back on track soon enough. Should he need to again remind them of their duties – well, Leonid thinks, as he pushes his way through the cold water of the river, he’s done it before. He can throw his weight around again, should it come to that.

Anything to be back at Skyhold, which at least serves to protect him from some of – _this._

“Leonid, wait,” starts Basten behind him.

But he won’t. He slips past the tangle of Kata-Meraad mercenaries wiping black blood from their swords and axes and preparing to head out and find the darkspawn hole that gave them all this trouble. Leonid ignores the pleased greeting Raset shouts at him and heads – straight as an arrow – toward the woods.

At Skyhold, he can at least pretend at – normalcy. At a _routine_ that doesn’t involve everyone he cares about being threatened by the very _worst_ the world has to offer every second fucking breath. Leonid rushes toward the trees, shoulders tight as he climbs the rocky slope that will lead him back to the Stone Tree and then to a camp with a horse and a means back to _something_ that resembles his usual _blighted life_.

Anything but _this._

As Leonid picks his way up the winding path, entering the uneven shadow of the sparse forest, he can make out Kubrasan’s familiar voice, an echo. _You do what you have to_ , her words snatched away by the wind overhead.

Wise words, he thinks, words that set something loose within his own chest. _Do what you have to_ : they burn at him with a wounded fury he can’t name. Something at once familiar and utterly strange.

_Skyhold._ He holds onto the thought. The fucking _tavern_ and someone’s _bed,_ and at least a moment’s illusion of _his life as it ought to be_.

Never this tightness in his chest, or the desperate, wild-eyed panic that carried him through that battle. Bad enough he’d lived through Haven. Worse still to have it _haunt_ him like this. Worse to _let_ it.

He shoves some branches out of the way, clambering his way up the steep slope until he’s made it to a plateau. Leonid thoughtlessly traces his way along what used to be a path, small pebbles crunching beneath the heel of his boot, and angles himself toward the coast. He’ll find where he needs to be soon enough. Anywhere is better than here.

Behind him, a sound. Leonid tosses a quick glance over his shoulder, and sees a familiar shape.

“Go _away,”_ he barks, picking up his pace.

“When there might still be darkspawn in these woods?” Basten, too, starts walking faster and his _damnable_ long legs mean than he’s caught up to Leonid before Leonid can so much as think of something _witty_ and _acidic_ to spit back. “I don’t think so. You shouldn’t go alone.”

Leonid huffs. “That’s what I _like,_ Basten. Being alone.” He shoulders his way through some brush, heading off the winding path to cut a more direct route back to camp.

“Leonid,” Basten says, a half-pace behind. The branches Leonid shoves out of the way must hit him as they snap back.

Good. Maybe that will put him off.

“Surely, I can find my way back to camp on my own. I don’t need someone to _mind_ me.” And he certainly doesn’t need someone to – _fret_ over. Someone whose loss might –

“I don’t _mind_ minding you,” Basten offers, as though that’s clever. “And, like you said, it’s good to have someone watching your back.”

“I didn’t – I said you don’t watch your own _damned back_ ,” Leonid spits. “So just return to your company and – I’ll be fine. I’ve at least a _modicum_ of _self-preservation_ , which is certainly more than I can say for _you.”_

_This_ is what self-preservation looks like, Leonid thinks furiously. They’ve crested the peak and the slope again grows sharp beneath Leonid’s feet. He cuts off an at angle, winding his way back to the path, because the sheer drop-offs will break his ankle again if he’s not careful, and once was enough.

Once was enough for everything.

Still, Basten follows. Doggedly.

_“Maker,”_ Leonid snarls, stopping to whirl and jab a finger at Basten’s chest. “I told you to _stop following me_. Go bother someone else.”

Basten blinks at him, head tilting. Frozen in place, with one placating hand in the air, as Leonid’s chest rises and falls like prey flushed from cover. Hard, vulnerable little breaths he _can’t_ smother.

They stand like that for a moment. In the distance, the sound of a crow, perhaps the echo of waves beating themselves useless against the store.

“Leonid,” Basten says finally, quiet and slow. He shifts, edging nearer – far too close, Leonid thinks. Far too _close._ “What’s this about?”

“What’s this _about,”_ he repeats numbly. Beneath his skin, a searing fury, like a fire that will never burn itself to ash. “What’s – By the _fucking Void_ , Basten. You almost _died.”_

Basten says nothing for a moment, blue eyes wide. Then, “I didn’t. I’ve been in plenty of fights that have gotten _much_ uglier. Kubrasan had a hand on the whole thing. It was –” He pauses, eyes narrowing. He steps closer still. “You were worried.”

Leonid can’t breathe. He –

So instead he laughs, thin and brittle. “I wasn’t – Don’t flatter yourself. I wasn’t more worried for you than I would be worried for anyone I –”

He bites it off. Folds his arms tight across his chest.

Basten watches him, silent, though his eyes flash with interest. With a damnable _perception,_ that blighted cleverness that thinks it sees far more than it possibly could, because there’s absolutely nothing to see.

Leonid sighs, hard. Looks past Basten’s shoulder to the forest beyond, which is sparse, lit up by the white sunlight fighting through gauzy grey cloud. Still, he’s damp and uncomfortable and his shoulders _ache,_ muscles still trembling with the spent energy of the battle.

“It’s just,” Leonid starts, wary, “that I’ve grown – _accustomed_ to you, Basten. And it’s not because there is anything remotely special about you, understand, but we do work well together. And I’ve learned that I don’t always work well with those around me, but _you._ You’re – sensible, for the most part, and not _unpleasant_ to be around. And I’d be rather cross if you died or had to join the Wardens or – were less present I suppose.”

Basten’s eyebrows inch up his forehead. “You’d be upset if I… was around less.”

“That doesn’t _mean_ anything,” Leonid adds, tone tight, arms still folded across his body. Glaring as he says it because it _doesn’t._ He’s just stating the bare facts. “You are a – _half-decent_ exemplar of traits considered admirable by many, which isn’t to say that those are traits I find particularly compelling, but they do many you easy to work with. Which matters not because I enjoy your company any more than I enjoy the company of anyone I fuck, but because the soldiers Cullen sent with me might very well stab me in the back when I’m not looking.” It’s slightly unjust, so he amends the statement. “Or let someone else stab me, maybe. Either way, I would like to work with _you_ when next I’m forced on some wretched little mission, and I need you _alive_ for that.”

Basten watches him, as intently as if he’s puzzling out some obscure text or – whatever it is that Qunari apostates might do that requires great amounts of concentration. “It's true,” he says finally, “I wouldn’t let anyone stab you.”

“Because you adore me,” Leonid finishes. “Others _don’t.”_

Basten doesn’t respond to the first words which, Leonid supposes distantly, may be a boon. He isn’t sure he could stand to have it confirmed so – bluntly. Isn’t sure he could be tugged closer _still_ to this damnable precipice he’s spent _years_ trying to avoid.

“And _you,”_ says Basten, as though he’s enunciating some complex spell in a forgotten tongue, “begrudgingly tolerate me.”

“Yes,” says Leonid, firm. Finally, he can breathe. He sighs, a long sound, some of the tension draining from the line of his shoulders. Yes, that’s it: he’s _accustomed_ to Basten. He _tolerates_ him.

“And when you came flying down the hill and threw yourself into the middle of things,” Basten continues. “That’s because you _tolerate_ me.”

As quickly as the tension left, it returns, irritation flaring beneath Leonid’s skin. His chin jerks up as he meets Basten’s stare with one of his own, all ice and frustration. “No,” he grinds out. “That’s because I’ve gotten much better at shooting things recently. I thought I should test my mettle.”

“You gave up higher ground to test your _archery_ skills,” Basten says, shoulders angled toward Leonid, leaning closer.

Leonid scoffs, looking again into the gray distance that separates them from the sea. “Anyone can kill things from higher ground. It takes true skill to murder from _lower_ ground – which, might I add, I did _extremely well_.”

“And the panic,” Basten continues. “That was because you thought you might not succeed.”

_“Yes,”_ hisses Leonid, glaring at his – companion.

A scuff as he edges closer still. “And that’s the only reason why.”

Leonid is fixed in place, wound tight as the spring on Varric’s crossbow. “Andraste’s holy tits, _yes,”_ he snaps, _“that_ is the only reason why – that and I’m used to you, Basten. And you won’t let me get stabbed.”

Basten stands now but a hands’ breadth from Leonid, looking down at him in that steady way that Leonid always finds to utterly – _disarming._

Which reminds him, in a flash, of what he must do. Of what he has to do for himself, and for Basten, who still draws closer to offer comfort, although Leonid’s given him every reason in the world to turn away.

“You’re an excellent companion,” Leonid murmurs, again blinking at the empty forest beyond. “But the rest of it needs to be over. No matter how _efficient._ It should be done. I’ve already broken all of my rules, and I _like_ my rules. They serve me incredibly well. After all,” he says, shooting Basten a bright smile that feels as painted on as a whore’s face, “I do have –”

Basten’s features are still, revealing nothing. He hasn’t moved. “Your reputation, of course. I understand. You’re an untameable spitfire; I know that.”

Leonid’s throat tightens, the damp making his fingers stiff as he tucks them harder against his folded arms. “It’s because I don’t do things I’m _bad_ at, on principle. It’s why there _are_ rules. They keep me from doing things I’m bad at.”

“Like – having too much sex with one person?” Basten asks, forehead creasing again. “I hate to break it to you, but you’re _definitely_ not bad at sleeping with the same person. In fact, you just get better.”

Leonid laughs, then, a brittle sound once it breaks past the tightness in his throat, the ache that lives inside his chest. “Well, _naturally_ that’s something I’m _good at._ One of my chief virtues is that I’m a great deal of fun in bed. It’s the rest of it.”

Still, Basten stands there, steady as – well, a _bastion_ of patience. “What rest of it?”

It’s that quiet question that does it, as if he doesn’t know. As if he hasn’t also felt –

“Maker,” snaps Leonid, “you _know_ what I mean, you ignorant brute. You –”

He stops. Pivots and takes several steps away – anything to give him some _space._ Some way to lessen this _feeling_ clawing against the inside of his ribs, insistent as a beast prowling dark woods. Hungry for blood.

When he looks back, Basten is still fixed in place. Watching, though his lips have turned downward.

“See,” says Leonid. _“This_ is why it has to be over: I can’t even explain myself without getting _mean,_ and you shouldn’t have mean, Basten. You’re better than _mean._ And so we’re going to put the rules firmly back in place and you can continue to be my friend.” Again, he tries for a smile; again, it falls flat, at such odds with the constriction of his chest. “How fortunate for you,” Leonid continues with a lightness he doesn’t feel, “to count yourself among such hallowed numbers!”

They stare at each other for the span of several heartbeats, and then Basten shrugs, easy. “Whatever you want, Leonid,” he says, though he doesn’t smile around the words. After a pause, “So you’re heading for Skyhold?”

Like that, the moment has passed. Leonid huffs out a breath, pushing his hair from his forehead. “I’ve a report to deliver, and angry soldiers to placate with drink. _If_ I can manage to pry them away from camp this afternoon, cross as they are with me. Even the promise of a cask may not be enough. Like I said, I did step on some toes. In a rather heavy-footed way.”

“I’ll take you.” Basten moves forward, toward the path just behind Leonid. Steady and unworried.

Leonid stiffens. “You don’t – You should –”

“Hey,” says Basten, reaching out to clap a hand to Leonid’s shoulder as he pushes past him. _“You’re_ the one who said _I’d_ be your choice companion from now on. Since I won’t let anyone stab you. Since I have a few traits some people might call admirable – people who aren’t you. We can even set up separate tents. It might not be efficient, but it will be _rule-abiding_.”

If anyone else said it, Leonid might worry that his toe-stepping had gone on apace. But Basten chases his words with an easy smile, palm warm against the curve of Leonid’s shoulder – a warmth that doesn’t linger, dropping away the moment he’s finished speaking and turned to work his way down the path that winds back to camp.

Basten isn't cross, but nausea twists Leonid's stomach just the same.

He pretends it doesn't.

“Won’t Kubrasan miss you?” asks Leonid, following in Basten’s footsteps and skirting slick boulders, the divots where rain has dug the dirt out from the path. Smoothing his voice to a mild interest that gives no clue as to the ache beneath his sternum.

Basten shoots him a look over his shoulder – one Leonid can’t decipher. “Of course she will,” he says, “but she told me to keep an eye on you.”

Somehow, Leonid doubts that, after the conversation they had, but he’s hardly going to argue the point when he can travel with Basten instead of _Alfric_ and _Wallas_ as a result. “Well,” he says amicably, “if you insist.”

“I do.” A firm statement, one that doesn’t allow any more questions.

Which is fine by Leonid. He has entirely run out of words for the moment, his ample stores of trickery and rhetorical distraction exhausted and leaving only the _truth_ – which is more dangerous than the darkspawn horde they’d just battled against. Far more likely to leave fatal wounds.

They cut their way down the slope, Leonid tossing one glance back over his shoulder to the shape of the peaks against the sky. If he squints against the white light, against the mist curling its way down the slopes, he can see the jutting shape of The Stone Tree emerge above the scrabbly trees surrounding it.

_It’s good luck_ , Basten had said with a crooked smile, just before Leonid had kissed him.

But Leonid doesn’t believe in luck: only brutal reality and what it does to those it’s inflicted upon. Certainly, there might be rare instances whereupon Andraste intervenes, moments of miraculous endings, but even she wasn’t saved from a wretched fate. It will catch them all in the end, _reality,_ no matter how cleverly they try to dart away.

Best to minimize vulnerabilities, he thinks resolutely, which includes relying less on _hope_ or _luck_ and more on things that numb him to the world. In short enough order, they find camp and pack their bags, saddling horses and taking off toward the Frostbacks – where once again Leonid will fall into line with the rules that keep him from hurting too deeply. Back to the comfortable divide between his heart and his life, muffled by drink and his insistence he not _feel this_ again. Not ever.

The world already stands on the precipice of disaster. He would avert this small one of his own.

When Basten sets up the two tents that night, Leonid says nothing. And he stays firmly, steadfastly inside the four walls of his own tent. If he wakes up in the night shivering, well. So be it.

Better cold than the other, far graver possibility. Never that again.


End file.
